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I’d written that Alejandro Jodorowsky had settled with Allen Klein, clearing the way for theatrical and DVD releases of his films, and now it’s been announced that May 1 is the release date for a boxed set of Jodorowsky’s El Topo, The Holy Mountain, and Fando y Lis. Prints of El Topo and Holy Mountain are currently touring the country. Not as spectacular as the Japanese box, but fantastic news nonetheless.

Turns out Shiina Ringo’s solo career hasn’t ended after all: February 21 brings us Heisei Fuuzoku, featuring mostly orchestral rearrangements of tunes from Kalk Samen Kuri No Kana as well as other Ringo records. My guess is that this is Ringo’s bid for overseas recognition as the album will be available through iTunes UK, and Ringo sings in English on some tracks.

The obscure doo-wop group The Poets were five teenagers from Thomas Jefferson High School in Los Angeles, arguably the birthplace of doo-wop music (its alumni included Richard Berry of The Pharaohs and The Robins, Cornell Gunter of The Platters and The Coasters, and Curtis Williams of The Penguins). They recorded one single for Flash Records in 1958, “Dead” b/w “Vowels of Love”.

Although “Vowels” ended up being better-known after the 1960s doo-wop revival (and is a perfectly fun little song), “Dead” is the real gem. A proto-rap Halloween-themed piece, where the kids make monster noises over spooky, heavily echoed minimal piano accompaniment. Some great lyrics, too.

The single went nowhere, and four of the five Poets went on to normal lives. The fifth, however, was Roy Ayers, soon to become the most famous jazz vibraphonist since Lionel Hampton.

Here are the released versions and early takes of both songs. The piano solo on the early take of “Dead” is a bit… dull. I imagine the engineer saying, “Uh, guys? Can you do something over the solo? Like laugh maniacally?”

“The name of this recording, Suck and Screw Orgy, by Allen Karminsky. This is an educational recording!”

And so begins this 8-track tape of a southern belle visiting a verile dentist. And it continues into the absurd as the writer reaches — and reaches far — for synonyms to keep from repeating the usual “parts of the body” nouns, and the actions that one conducts with them.

“Oh, excuse me — am I interrupting something?”
“Well, I was just about to begin some oral surgery, nurse, it’s quite a delicate operation…”

NSFW, mainly because of the moaning rather than much of the language, which is not so much prurient as awkward, since any and all lurid actions must be explicitly described. The cover is also NSFW, and seems to be a generic stock photo that was also used on the 8-track “Dr. Kaufman Examines Crystal”, the next part of this series.